While they continued the pace, Jezzie relished that she could lose herself in the motion and the sheer energy seeping up from the horse. She concentrated on nothing but holding on and the force of the wind in her ears. It was welcome, if fleeting respite from the confusion and disorientation.

As the pace of the horse slowed, eventually to an easy gallup, she ventured to lift her head and look around. They were well past the small hills by now, had raced over an expanse of field and were approaching a small wooded area. Once inside the shelter of the trees, the rider gave a quick click with his tongue and the animal slowed to a trot and then stood. It's breath came in long and steady gasps. Jezzie felt the man's hands steady her waist firmly but gently and then he dismounted. He gave his horse a firm pat and then offered his arm to help her down. Still gripping the leather bound book under one arm, she grasped his hand and leapt easily down. Those horseback riding lessons she'd taken as a young girl did pay off.

"What happened back there?" he asked after a moment.

"You tell me," she began. "I have no idea what's going on. I don't even know where I am."

"That book... I can't even ... that book ...  spoke to you!"

"I don't understand it," she said, inwardly relieved that he had heard it as well.

"It spoke to you," he said again, as though trying to convince himself. "It said 'flee,' as though it were trying ... trying to protect you."

"From what?" she wondered aloud, hoping for the first time that the warning was not against the very man in front of her. 

They were both silent a moment, each make sense of their own impossibilities. 

"You said you'd read the name of this kingdom in that book," he began. "Where, may I inquire, did you come by this book? Who is the author? What is the tale?"

Jezzie shook her head, trying to clear her thoughts. How could she answer this man's questions when she had so many of her own that needed answers.

"It was just a cast-off book," she said, "I picked it up and started to read... and there was this light... and then...." She didn't know where to begin, what to say. And suddenly, without warning, she felt her face flush and knew she was close to tears.

"My lady," he began, "please forgive me. I never meant to distress you so. Perhaps if we look inside the book we'll understand it better."

Jezzie lifted the book in two hands, fingering the etched lettering in the worn cover.

"I think that's how I got into this mess to begin with," she said at last. "I'd like to wait on that. I will tell you what I remember, though."

Jezzie recounted for him that the book seemed to hold some record of a journey.

"A quest," she said. "It said it was his quest."

"Whose?"

"His name was Sir Edward Ellis III," she told him, "First Knight to King Calera."

At the mention of the name, the young man's face took on a look of surprise and obvious recognition.

"Sir Edward?" he said. "That name is not oft spoken here. Sir Edward is long dead, my lady. Hung, in fact."

"What for?" Jezzie asked, astonished that she had even this remotest of connection to someone who could have been hung.

"For dabbling, my lady, in the Black Arts," he told her.

"Magic?"

He paused a moment, looking at her with a serious, almost dour, expression.  

"Witchcraft," he said at last.